Buying a ring abroad

[paddymick_2000]

Hi,

I live in dublin, Ireland and have a question I hope you can help me with.

I plan to bring my girlfriend away for a holiday and get engaged and buy a ring.

Where would be a good place to go to get an inexpensive ring with little hassle.

Ireland is very expensive country, would europe or somewhere in the USA be the best option.

Hope you can help.

Thanks
Michael

 

[paddymick_2000]

or tax free region

 

[valeria101]

Here''s plan:

Order ring online from US state X, travel to the US to state Y, have the ring FedEx to your hotel. End of deal. Makes sense only if you have other reasons to look forward to a trip to the East Coast at this time of the year !

And then, you''d be buying online

 

[diablo]

Aha I live in Dublin too and this is exactly the same issue I have. You will get completely ripped off buying from a Dublin jeweller. I visited a few to get an idea of prices and it was really frustrating. They just wouldn''t give a straight answer about Colour and Clarity and they don''t seem to have heard about Cut quality which is the most important characteristic of a diamond. The really worrying thing is that if you do some research for a few hours on a site like this you will have more knowledge than the average sales assistant in a Dublin jewellery shop. They make their money on the igonorance of the buying public. Also most of the diamonds are uncertified and the ones that are independently certified attract a big price premium. One example was Field''s jewellers in Dublin: They had a round, G, VS2, 0.53 carat, no info on cut! for Euro 4,500 including the setting! (That''s about $6,000 for American readers). Just compare that price to the prices quoted on pricescope for a similar diamond.

That''s the bad news. Here is my solution:

1: I did a lot of research on sites such as pricescope and blue nile.
2: Based on the above I picked out a diamond on bluenile.com It''s 1.2 carat, G coloured, SI1, AGS0 ideal cut diamond. It scores 1.3 on the cut adviser on this site. The price including setting in a platinum ring is just under $7,000 (just over Euro 5,000 at current exchange rates).
3: I booked 2 flights to New York for next weekend for Euro 300 return each (That''s one thing that''s cheap in Dublin)
4: Booked 4 nights in a nice Manhattan hotel.
4: I have arranged for the helpful people at Blue nile to ship the ring to a Fedex office in Manhattan. It will arrive in New York the same day as we do.
5: Basically I will save a fortune on the ring and I will get engaged in one of the greatest cities in the world.

Obviously there is an element of risk because I haven''t seen the ring which is why I went for a reasonably high quality diamond and if I need to return it things could get complicated because I can''t hang around NY forever. If the ring has to be reshipped to Dublin because of a problem I would be hit with 21% VAT by customs. Overall I think the benefits far outweigh the risks. If you don''t feel comfortable with that, blue nile have a site that ships to Ireland www.bluenile.co.uk but you will have to pay 21% VAT on top of the quoted prices.

Anyway I will let you know how I get on in NY and will post some picture of the ring.

 

[pyramid]

At the moment in the UK the rates are 17.5% VAT, Import duty 5%, advalorem duty because of european WTO dispute with the USA 14% = total 36.5%. Advalorem duty is rising at 1% per month until 1 March 2005 when it will remain at 17% until reviewed.

 

[diablo]

I think the point of the bluenile.co.uk site is that he will have to pay the VAT but he can avoid the customs and other duties because it will ship from within Europe. Therefore his additional cost would be 21% Irish VAT. As outlined in my previous post the best way to avoid taxes and duties is to "import" it on your fiance''s finger.

 

[paddymick_2000]

if I was buying it would be in a high street shop

is there still savings to be made going down this route